Star rapper, MI, has lamented that the the legacies of Nigerian musicians are being handed over to European entrepreneurs.
This, he said, were like the artefacts the country was struggling to get fromn Europe again being deliberately handed over to the continent.
According to him, musicians fall for this trap because there is no proper structure at home.
He noted this on Friday during a session tagged ‘The Africa Policy Dialogue Series: Harnessing Africa’s Demographic Dividend for Peace, Security and Productivity through Investments in Youth’.
It was organised by Harvard Kenny School Alumni Association of Nigeria.
The artiste with the real name, Jude Abaga, said that the situation was so contradicting that taxes being paid by Nigerian artistes were going to foreign countries:
“In 2000, there was no music industry and the first people that started had no structure around them and literally even today as we speak, that structure is being built every day and unfortunately, what we find out is that our top artistes, if you take the top 10 Nigerian artistes, majority of their taxes are being paid to foreign countries, majority of their workforce will be people that are outside of the country.
“There are some investments in the music business but the real big investments are coming from outside and those catalogues, gradually, we are selling them off. As Europe is returning some of our artefacts, we are giving them our artefacts for the next 100 years.
“The bulk of my catalogue is now domiciled under some company that is owned by someone else there (abroad). It is almost like the burden to prove that their ideas and capabilities are viable is on the young Nigerians.”
The Nigerian music and film industries have continued to grow, with the latter contributing to the GDP while the first is, however, still floating in terms of structure.
